


somewhere between desperate and divine

by kitterkatter



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, College Student Rey (Star Wars), Demon Kylo Ren, Demon and Witch AU, Eventual Smut, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Paranormal, Southern Gothic AU, The AU no one asked for, Witch Rey, that feeling when ur lonely so you summon a demon just to chat
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-07-13 21:24:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16026254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitterkatter/pseuds/kitterkatter
Summary: “The angels are gone. They have been for a long time. It’s just us now.”Rey pauses.“Us?” She asks, mostly for clarification on what mythical beings are inhabiting her sleepy college town. Yet, its also to quell the ridiculous little thought that, though she struggles to feel at home anywhere, she might have some place in this “us”. Some place in something beyond her insignificant human existence, now that she knows that there is such a beyond.What a semester.“Demons, though they’ve mostly grown bored with this world. And those who are not quite human, not quite demon, and certainly not quite angel. Those who are something else entirely.”“Who?”He looks at her with either awe or amusement, she supposes its a fine line.“You, little witch.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My first Reylo fic! Not sure how fast/slow the burn is going to be yet, so for now lets just say medium burn? If that's a thing? My tumblr is jahkku if you want to follow me there. Thanks for reading!! :~)

 

Rey is a bit embarrassed about her part time job. It pays well, the hours are flexible, and the work is fairly easy, but there’s always a weird turn in conversation when she tells people exactly where she works. 

And now, as Rey is just finally making some college friends in the backyard of a filthy house party, the conversation is going predictably. 

Finn’s eyes widen over his plastic red cup, “You work in a magic shop?” 

Rey hums a regretful “mhmm” while staring into her own drink. The bubbles of her vodka sprite (which tasted more like rubbing alcohol with a splash of carbonation) vibrated from the ridiculously bass boosted music pulsating from the house. She’d been holding the same one all night and its contents had only barely decreased. The last thing Rey wanted was to get hammered with people she barely knew; If her childhood taught her anything, it was that trust was not something she should easily hand out. 

“Oh my god, like, card tricks? Ooo! Or pulling rabbits out of hats?” Rose asks with drunken enthusiasm.

“Uh, well-”

Rey can see the gears turn in Rose’s intoxicated brain as she comes to a realization: “Wait, does that mean you know tricks? Oh my god please do a magic trick! Just a card trick! Please please pleeeaaaase”

As Rose leans forward, continuing to beg Rey to do something, _anything_ , magical, her booze soaked sneaker squelches and slips in the booze soaked mud and Rey grabs her booze soaked sleeve before the girl can topple face first into the booze (and vomit) soaked ground. 

Parties are gross. 

Finn, completely distracted and unaware of his friend’s struggle against gravity, starts to walk away, “I bet there’s a deck of cards laying around this place…” 

Rey drops her cup, contributing to the swirl of alcohol and sugary soda accumulating below them, and grabs him too. _Normally_ , she’d let people believe that she just worked in some dorky magician store, since _normally_ people would just move on from the subject and dismiss it as a just slightly atypical minimum wage gig. Rey could tell that these two weren’t quite normal. So Rey figures its best to clarify. Who wants to start a friendship with a lie anyways?

Rey sighs, hands full of two newfound friends, and fesses up, “Guys, guys, no it’s not that sort of magic shop. It’s like… a witchy store?”

Rey’s not sure of the best way to describe “Maz Kanata’s Magickal Emporium and Herbalist Apothecary.” It’s really just a tiny shop nestled in the dying albeit historic part of town, in-between an actual pharmacy and a bookstore. About half of the customers are either confused by the word “apothecary” and wander in thinking its just a quirky drug store (“do you guys have Advil?”) or they think its some medical marijuana dispensary. The former usually storm out to go next-door and the latter sometimes stay and browse the merchandise anyways. 

“Ohhh one of the touristy places uptown?” Finn asks, clearly the more sober of the two people in her clutches.

“Right!” Rey didn’t know that most people were aware of the town’s weird niche witchy-tourism industry. There was some obscure history surrounding the town Takodana that brought in a small number of people interested in magical or occult things. Rey had not actually read up on any of this (she’s an engineering major, give her a break) but she had met many of the people interested in this sort of thing, as they always found their way to the shop. 

Rey lets go of Finn, but keeps holding onto Rose just in case. She looks up at Rey with a pitiful little pout, “Rey?”

“Yes?”

Rose looks down sadly at Rey’s abandoned red cup, as if it were a lost puppy, “You dropped your drink.” 

 

————

 

Let the record show that Rey does not believe in any of this stuff. Seriously. 

The first day Rey wandered into Maz Kanata’s Magickal Emporium and Herbalist Apothecary, it was her freshman year and she was in pursuit of a cat. In her defense, it was an adorable little orange and white fluff ball and Rey just could not resist the urge to pet it. Meows were exchanged and the cat began to wander off, but Rey believed that this cat intended for her to follow. 

She had always preferred animals to humans (better listeners), and had a bad habit of believing she could understand them as much as they seemed to understand her. Rey was aware of this flaw and would normally shake herself out of such fanciful notions that a cat may be trying to lead her somewhere. This cat, though, would walk several steps ahead of her before turning and meowing, stopping and staring at Rey with an expectant gaze. So no, Rey decided she was not so crazy to believe that this cat was truly taking her somewhere. 

Eventually they ended up at a run down section of old colonial storefronts, one of which had a “Help Wanted” sign haphazardly taped to the window. Rey concluded that this was the nicest cat ever. 

She wasn’t quite sure what to make of the place. It was a crowded, narrow, shop that was so cluttered you couldn’t see where it ended from the doorway. Rey was, quite honestly, impressed at how the shop utilized what little space it had to display so many things. Every square inch of wall space was covered in knick knacks by way of shelves, hooks, or frames. A row of long tables divided the store in two, displaying ouija boards, crystals, or vials of various substances. The clutter was so overwhelming that Rey hadn’t even noticed the tiny old woman perched on the countertop. 

“Why hello there! Did you mean to go to the pharmacy? It’s next-door,” the woman called, her eyes not looking up from a very thick book atop her lap. Her legs swung beneath her, clunking against the front of the counter. She looked positively _ancient_ , but her energy and demeanor were those of a hippie in her twenties. 

“Uh, no.” Rey paused, “Is this your cat?”

He meowed.

The woman’s gaze snapped upward. “Beebee!”

She jumped down from the countertop and Rey nearly rushed forward to catch her as she was sure this woman’s frail bones could not take it, but she landed with grace and scooped up Beebee, cuddling him to her chest. 

Rey hated to ruin the moment, but she could not get the “Help Wanted” sign out of her head. 

“So uh, I saw outside um,” Rey awkwardly motioned towards the window, “That you maybe had a job open?”

The woman stalked towards her, catlike, until her toes were nearly touching Rey’s. Beebee jumped out from her arms onto the floor. Standing before her, her head did not even reach Rey’s shoulders. Despite her small stature, Rey was inexplicably intimidated.

The woman grabbed Rey by the shoulders and pulled her down before she could protest, bringing them to eye level. The unanticipated contact made her wince, a reflexive remnant of her past. She seemed to notice this and let go of Rey with the ghost of a sympathetic smile. Rey stayed hunched at the woman’s height as she stared intensely into Rey’s eyes. After an uncomfortable beat, the woman’s face split into a grin. 

“For you, yes! We’re hiring! You’ve got the job.” 

“What? Wait, you don’t even know my name!”

“Well what is your name?”

“Rey.”

“Nice to meet you Rey, I’m Maz.”

The woman walked past her, out the door to the ‘Help Wanted’ sign and cheerily tore it down. 

_This is crazy. She’s crazy._

“There’s only three things you need to know about working here. One: the greenhouse is out back, but it is strictly employees-only until I can figure out if someone is stealing my poppies or if I just keep misplacing them. So if someone asks about a plant, just send them to me, or if I’m not here, just walk in the back and check. Two: the books over there are organized alphabetically by title, not by author. And three: Never, under any circumstances, ever go in the basement.”

Immediately, Rey’s eyes darted to the little trap door towards the back of the store. It was just a wooden square with a handle fashioned from rope, almost like something you would see in a child’s tree house. She had never noticed it before, and she wasn’t entirely sure just how she knew it was there. A sense of unease washed over her. It was if her eyes had moved on their own accord.

Sensing her hesitation, Maz added: “I’ll pay you double the minimum wage.”

_Fuck it._

“Done.”

Max cracked a smile, “Welcome to the team, Rey.”

A mixture of both relief and disbelief, Rey let out a breathy laugh, “So no interview?”

“No need for one. I saw your eyes.”

—————————————

After two years of working in Maz’s shop, Rey still finds the old woman unpredictable. As far as she knows, Rey is her only employee, yet she seems to be able to walk in and work whenever she wants to and for however long she wants to. Sometimes Maz is there, sometimes she isn’t. Sometimes Rey swears she isn’t there until, after a few hours, she pops out from behind some shelf and scares Rey half to death. 

So, when Maz starts frequenting her basement a little more often than usual, Rey tries to keep her curiosity in check. 

“Just Maz being Maz.” Rey says, following the hollow wooden sound of the trap door closing. “You get it, right?” 

Rey looks up from her thermodynamics textbook to her conversation partner: a ball of orange and white perched atop the dusty counter. He gives her a slow, disbelieving blink.

“Don’t look at me like that. Curiosity is what killed you, you know.”

The rickety TV, complete with jagged antennas possibly made from clothes hangars, buzzes in the background. Some woman with hair too large is reporting on a story too morbid for this hour. 

“ _Another young woman has gone missing this week North Carolina. No word yet on if this case is connected to the other three missing persons cases reported in the past six months. More on that tonight at eleven, but now, I’ll pass it over to Trent who has a video of a dog who learned to surf-“_

Rey shuts the TV off and tries to go back to studying. Honestly, she really does. But there’s something off. Something about today. Something that’s present in her gut: a pull that’s not quite pulling. Something in the air that makes it feel too stagnant, too heavy. Something weighing her down, and something pushing her forward. She wants to shake both of them off. 

Christ, thermodynamics really does make her head spin.

She has to get up. Her body is telling her to, begging her to. And so her brain surrenders to its vessel, slamming the book shut and pushing the stool away from the counter. It must be abrupt, because Beebee startles. 

“Why so jumpy?” She teases, though her voice comes out a little breathless. 

Rey paces up and down the narrow store. She probably just needs to stretch her legs, rest her eyes, before returning to school work. Maybe a glass of water. Maybe her blood sugar’s low. She thinks she packed a granola bar in her bag somewhere- 

A thunderous clatter shakes Rey to her core. She’s across the floor and kneeling by the trap door in minutes, her thoughts racing with panicked images of Maz’s frail old self with broken legs or fractured arms or cracked skulls-

“Maz? You ok?”

Rey’s ears receives nothing in response. Her hand hovers hesitantly over the handle to the trap door, as if she expected it to be searing hot. 

_Never, under any circumstances, ever go in the basement._

Another crash, so strong it shakes the floorboards, sends Rey into full out panic mode. That unsettling pull in her stomach, mixed with sloshing adrenaline, practically _yanks_ her down towards the trap door. So fast she could barely register she had done it, Rey whips open the rickety door and flies down the narrow (definitely not to code) flight of stairs. An unnatural gust of wind, salty and hot, nearly pushes her back into the staircase. The rush of air surrounds her, deafens her, and it takes a minute for Rey to register what she is seeing.

The basement is dark. There are only two sources of light, one of which is a single lightbulb hanging in the center of the basement’s ceiling, emitting a dim warm light over nearly the entire room, but softening to black at the corners and crevices. Bookshelves line the room, but what they hold is a mystery that the weak lightbulb cannot reveal, leaving their hollow spaces in darkness. Rey’s eyes travel down them and onto the floor, where light is catching on, what is that? Oh. Broken glass, probably jars to use for some of Maz’s dried herbs.. _That’s what the noises were, then._

Rey’s eyes travel to the second light source: candles. Tons of them. Arranged in a neat circle beneath the lightbulb, surrounding some geometric scrawl, flickering and waning in the wind-

_Oh._

_Wind._

_Why is there wind down here? Why aren’t the candles being blown out?_

At the edge of the circle stands the silhouette of Maz. The tiny old woman’s back is facing Rey. She has yet to notice the intrusion, probably unable to hear her footsteps over the gusts of wind. Maz is swaying, mumbling something, something Rey cannot possibly hear but something that sends shivers down her spine nonetheless. Swaying, swaying, like something ancient and durable. Like the skinny tree you never expect to survive the storm but it does, it outlasts all the rest, because it bends and bows with the winds without ever breaking. But perhaps this little tree has had one too many storms, because it only takes one large gust for it to break, and Maz is leaning terribly far and there’s a dark cloud beginning to form beneath the lightbulb and before Rey knows it she's rushing forward before Maz can stumble.

There’s another sound now, rising above the wind. Something otherworldly, unsettling, terrifying, but not entirely _wrong_. Not unlike the pull in her gut, uncomfortable but apart of her. Its a booming, rolling sound, like thunder that approaches as it crashes, like waves on a shore, like- 

_Laughter_. 

Something, someone, is laughing at her, and its not Maz.

_“I didn’t know you picked up strays, Maz,”_ It says, unbelievably low, yet crystal clear over the rush of the wind. 

Maz goes rigid, halting in her swaying and mumbling. Her head whips around, eyes wide and wild, a mix of anger and fear. 

The dark clouds disperse. The wind takes one last powerful, swirling gust, blowing out the entire ring of candles. Thin swirls of smoke climb up towards the ceiling behind Maz, who looks like a force of nature herself. 

“What did I say about going in the basement?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "...something has gone wrong, Rey. There’s been a tear in the shroud. And, as everyone knows, evil seeps in through the swamps.”
> 
> Rey thinks she might possibly be even more confused than she was before this conversation.
> 
> “Again, eventually I will explain to you the full extent of the situation. The point is, I was summoning a demon in the basement.”
> 
> Rey spits out her tea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this took way more words than I expected. I think this one's gonna be a slow burn, so buckle up pals. 
> 
> Warning: there's some more drinking in this one, as well as mentions of being drugged (no one actually gets drugged, though).

The only way Rey knows how to respond to this situation is with an endless string of apologies, but as she rambles, the “I’m so sorry”s begin to devolve into something like half hearted justifications:

“…It’s just that I heard all this wooshing and crashing and I thought you might be hurt, and I feel like life and death circumstances should make for an exception to the rule, you know? And I’ll have you know that I didn’t come down here after the first crash, I waited for the second one. I really did try Maz, I promise it was all out of concern and _pleasedon’tfiremeIreallyneedthisjobanditwon’thappenagain-_ ”

Rey’s voice fades as she realizes her words are clearly not reaching her boss. Maz looks like her mind has jumped ship and escaped to another planet. Her gaze is off in some nondescript corner, unfocused and glazed. 

“Maz?”

The trance breaks. Maz looks up at Rey, not with anger but with something like sadness.

“Let’s get out of this basement, huh? We should talk over something to drink.”

Rey nods, eager to comply with anything that will allow her to stay employed. 

The two head upstairs, Maz in the lead. Meanwhile, Rey allows herself to look back at the wreckage. Broken glass, toppled over candles (thankfully all burnt out), and other various objects are scattered across the floor, thrown from their shelves by the wind-

_Wind_.

Rey realizes she hasn’t taken the time to fully process what she has witnessed. It’s been all survival mode, an anxious spiral fueled by the idea of being without work in a foreign country with an apartment she can barely pay the the rent for and what if she can’t afford her tuition or she loses her scholarship and _really_ can't afford her tuition and has to drop out and has to go back to England and where will she live what will she do and why are textbooks so goddamn expensive and-

“Maz?” Rey asks, cringing a little at how pathetic her voice sounds to her own ears.

Maz has fully ascended onto the ground floor. She looks down at her, bathed in the dusty beams of late afternoon light that stream in through the windows. 

“I know you will have a lot of questions. We’ll get to that once we’ve settled and gotten ourselves something to drink-”

“Are you going to fire me?”

Maz almost winces, but her face quickly falls back to her usual kind expression. She reaches out her hand, ready to pull Rey out from the darkness. 

“Of course not.”

\----

Wordlessly, the two of them settle at a low table in a back corner of Maz’s greenhouse. Part of Rey wonders if this is a strategic move (it's no secret that this is Rey’s favorite spot in the whole shop), but most of her is just happy to be outside. The green space calms her, it always has. The warmth of it all, late spring heat enveloping her like a hug. The light, breaking through the glass walls and bouncing off of the bright white furniture. The plants, their leaves so many varying shades of green they were practically a monochromatic rainbow all by themselves. The beautiful flowers, dotted among them at random. Once, when Rey was so stressed about her schoolwork that she felt as though her brain might unravel, Maz took her back here and, slowly, took her through every plant, one by one. She told her their names, both scientific and colloquial, their uses (from pain relief to poison), and their magical properties (which Rey politely pretended to believe). The combination of the methodical botanical tour, Maz’s calm voice, and the concentration of fresh air all brought Rey to a kind of peace that she rarely experienced. 

“They like you.” Maz had said. 

“Who?”

“The plants. See? See how they lean? The shift is small, but it’s there. Trust me. They’re all leaning toward you. Like you’re the sun.” 

 

Now, the calming memories of the greenhouse are only barely enough to keep Rey at ease. Her leg is bouncing furiously of its own accord, threatening to knock the table over along with the tea that Maz has so quickly prepared. 

Rey, in an attempt to break some tension, only half-jokingly starts to interrogate Maz, “Is this some type of memory loss plant? Or something to calm me down? Put me to sleep?” 

Maz shakes her head, “No, child. Just Earl Grey and some sugar.”

Rey takes a tentative sip and is relieved to taste the familiar, steeping herself in it before inquiring into the wildly vast unknown. 

“I really wanted to avoid this conversation. Clearly, now that’s not possible. I guessing that you have a lot of questions.” Maz begins.

Rey flicks her eyes towards her. _Understatement of the year._

She continues, “And when the time is right, they will all be answered. I promise. There are just a few key things I need you to understand right now, given what you have seen.”

She pauses, as though expecting some sort of protest. Rey gives her none.

“The world is more complicated than you have been taught to believe. You see, our world is not the only world. There are layers of worlds, of realms. Just how many layers is still unknown, of course. These other worlds hold other beings, beings that should be kept out of this one.”

Maz quickly shakes her head and gives her best attempt at simplification:

“I’m not trying to confuse you. What I’m saying is, there are creatures that should be kept out of this world, that, for whatever reason, have been slipping though, especially within the last couple of months. Have you been watching the news? Those girls, missing in the woods, gone without a trace. The thing that keeps us safe from the other worlds- something has gone wrong, Rey. There’s been a tear in the shroud. And, as everyone knows, evil seeps in through the swamps.” 

Rey thinks she might possibly be even more confused than she was before this conversation.

“Again, eventually I will explain to you the full extent of the situation. The point is, I was summoning a demon in the basement.”

Rey spits out her tea.

_What the fuck?!_

She must have actually said that last thing out loud, because she hears a strangled sound, like weakly contained laughter fighting its way to the surface. Maz’s eyes are bright, crinkles at the edges. 

“Rey, child, you’re a breath of fresh air, but this is actually a quite serious matter. Demons, spirits, monsters, whatever you wish to call them, _things_ are coming up from the underworlds, over worlds, side worlds, whatever direction they exist in. These creatures are tormenting humans, possibly even killing them. The demon I was summoning, I have reason to believe he might have something to do with this.” 

“He?” Rey’s head is spinning. If Maz had told her this yesterday, she would have been concerned for her mental health. Sure, she’d always been eccentric, but demons? Other worlds? A "tear in the shroud?" And yet, Rey had felt the wind. She saw those jars break, the candles flicker, the dark cloud accumulating in the center of the room. She’d heard that _voice_ , clear as day. 

“Yes, ‘he.’ Kylo Ren.” 

————————————-

 

It’s been previously mentioned that Rey does not like parties. Yet somehow, she always finds herself ending up at one, usually at the hands of Rose and/or Finn. But usually Rose. 

“Rey.” Rose is staring at her with an unrelenting pout.

“Rose.” Rey mimics her tone, tilting her head over her coffee, the steam rising and warming her face.

“ _Please_.”

“Funny how you think that one word will change my mind.” 

“Reyyy,” Rose draws out her name in an extended whine before slamming her hands down onto the coffee shop table, “I _deserve_ this.”

“Do you now?”

Rose sighs in half-joking irritation, “I have been slaving over my homework at the library all week. I’m completely worn out. I need to let off some steam.”

“Maybe you should take this weekend to get some more sleep?” Rey attempts, but she knows its in vain. Rose could party nearly as hard as she worked, and Rey knows firsthand that her friend practically lives in the library. Every few weeks, Rose takes one weekend to get all of the partying out of her system, which seemed to be one of the only ways her friend could fully destress. Sometimes that worries Rey, but she also supposes that everyone copes with college a little differently, and Rose, despite her occasional need to take part in an absolute rager, had always been level headed. 

Rose lets out a peal of mock laughter, before turning her face back to stone, as if this were the most serious conversation she had ever held in her life, “No. Exams are over and I just need to drink away this past week. Besides, it’s a woodser.”

Yes, Rey still hates parties, but if Rey were to rank the types of parties that Rose drags her to from godawful to slightly less worse, woodsers would probably be at the less worse end. 

“Fine,” Rey surrenders, a half smile playing at her lips as her hands worry around her coffee cup. A little intoxication might do Rey some good, especially after her earth-shattering conversation with Maz yesterday. As Rose’s squeal of delight reaches her ears, Rey sincerely hopes she won’t regret this. 

——————-----------------------------------

Rey swears the swamp sings to her. 

Not that she’d ever tell anyone that.

When Rey had received her acceptance (and scholarship, though not full ride) to a fairly prestigious yet small college in the armpit of Nowhere, USA, she immediately booked her flight. Getting the hell out of dodge had been her only goal, dodge being her shithole of a foster home back in the UK. She hadn’t really cared where the school was, as long as it was far, far away from home, if she could even use that word. She hadn’t thought about the climate, the city, the state, the American student life, or really anything. When she’d landed, she'd expected the worst. 

But, over time, Rey learned to love the landscape of the American south more that she ever expected to, so much so that she became grateful for Takodana’s location, nestled near the wetlands of eastern North Carolina. When it all became too much, the schoolwork, the financial pressures, the ever-looming threat of being sent home, being forcibly put back in the system that she had tried so hard to disentangle herself from, she would walk. Rey would walk deep into the woods for miles until she reached the cypress swamps, where the trees rise out of the water like sirens standing amongst the waves and calling out to her, drawing her in. Sunlight there is scattered and broken, forced to filter through thick curtains of Spanish moss that hang from the branches like matted locks of witch’s hair. Sometimes, when the fog rolls in, thick and heavy, caressing the bases of the trees, Rey almost feels like she’s on another planet. Somewhere, there is a long boardwalk, mostly abandoned, with holes where bits of wood have rotted away, unable to survive in this environment, unlike the cypress trees that seem to live forever. Rey walks there so often that she has memorized where the bad boards are, skipping over them with rhythmic, expert footing. A vague, fragmented memory of a childhood game of hopscotch lingers at the edge of her mind. She walks there, and she _listens_. She listens to the swamp: the trees with their tangled limbs and matted hair, the waters, the creatures that lurk beneath it, the birds, the ever present cloud of gnats, all of it. All of it sings to her, a low, droning, harmonious note. It sounds something like what Rey imagines peace sounds like.

Rey had mentioned once how she liked the sound of the woods, especially the cypress swamp, to Finn, but he just laughed and blamed it on the cicadas. 

In short, Rey enjoys being around nature, so if she absolutely has to go to a party, she’d like it to be a woodser. 

A woodser, for those unfamiliar like Rey had been her freshman year when she was dragged out to one for the first time, is a gathering of college students in the middle of the forest where they proceed to get completely trashed. Sometimes (if you’re lucky) there's a bonfire. And sometimes (if you’re unlucky) there's a vaguely “country” dress theme, an unfortunate product of being in the American south. 

Tonight, Rey is unlucky. 

“Just take the boots.”

“Absolutely not. I draw the line at flannel. I can tolerate flannel.”

Rose is holding out a pair of her “spare party boots” that Rey has no idea why anyone would possess. 

Finn pops his head out from the corner of Rose’s apartment’s living room, donned in a shit eating grin and a denim shirt that has had the sleeves violently hacked off. 

“What do you think?” Finn asks, twirling for dramatic effect.

A smile splits across Rey’s face, “Absolutely appalling. I love it.”

“That’s exactly what I was going for.” 

Rose laughs before announcing, “I’ve got the location. Lets go get trashed in the woods.”

 

———————

 

Something about a crowd of intoxicated college students really should take away from the calming aspects of these woods, but Rey chooses to focus on the beauty. Yes, there are shitty frat guys inevitably vomiting behind some of those trees. Yes, there are bound to be discarded hunks of red plastic and aluminum polluting the ground in the morning. Yes, there are the godawful getups of flannel, camo, boots, and excessive denim.And yes, the band is playing country music, but at least it's an actual band instead of some asshole’s phone plugged into an overpriced, name brand speaker. There’s a fog tonight, curling along the forest floor and causing the distant trees to fade away, looking like they go on forever. There’s a bonfire, too, its flames dancing to dangerous heights, sparks floating upwards to join the stars that look down through breaks in the trees. Underneath all of this, though, is a feeling of unease. Perhaps it's just from the events of the past few days, bizarre as they have been. Nonetheless, it's there: a tug, something at the pit of her stomach, a sense that something in the air might be off tonight. 

But Rey knows this place. Its close to the boardwalk that winds through the cypress swamp. Just knowing that is enough to comfort her from that wary feeling. 

“Rey! They’re doing keg stands!” Rose excitedly runs up to her, a slight flush across her cheeks making her look even more adorable than she normally does.

“You should absolutely not do that.”

Rose nods vigorously, like Rey had just proven her point, “You’re right. _You_ should!”

Rey is about to say no, about to find Finn for backup. Really, she is. But something stops her. The firelight flickering across Rose’s persistent expression brings the memory of candles, of Maz’s basement, flooding back into her head. The fear of being fired. The fear that she is living in a place that is more sinister than she knows, when she thought the world couldn’t get much worse.

Suddenly, drowning her liver in alcohol seems quite appealing. Maybe it will wash those memories away. Besides, it's late in the semester, summer hanging over their heads, and with it came heat, muggy and wet. Some cold beer wouldn't be a horrible idea right now.

Even more suddenly, her feet are moving on their own, and before she knows it, she's experiencing weightlessness as two strangers grab her by the ankles and suspend her upside down. Exactly fifty one seconds later of awful, _awful_ beer streaming into her stomach, she’s being let down and the chanting turns to cheers. Rey stumbles away, wiping the corner of her mouth as the next victim steps up to the plate. 

Finn seems to materialize out of nowhere, amused but sightly concerned, “I thought you didn’t want to party tonight?” 

Rey grins, more to reassure herself than him, and replies, “I changed my mind.” 

 

One shot of whiskey and three fourths of a can of Fourloko later, Rey is feeling delightfully warm. Her senses are fuzzy, but the majority of the alcohol has yet to fully affect her. She feels the pull again, churning inside of her. At first, she mistakes it for nausea, and quickly runs into the trees for privacy should she need to empty her stomach. She finds herself gripping a tree (she’s pretty sure it's an oak) for support, leaning away from the sound of the crowd’s uproarious response to the first few notes of Wagon Wheel (She has to admit, she doesn’t hate the song, though it is absolutely overplayed in this godforsaken state). 

Rey hunches over and awaits the coming sickness, but it never reaches her. Instead, that same churning feeling is pushing her forward. For some reason, possibly curiosity and alcohol dampened senses, she follows it. Deeper into the woods, past the maze of pines and maples and oaks, towards the cypress trees. The smell of smoke fades as the fog grows thicker, kissing her ankles and painting the woods in a dreamlike haze. It’s beautiful and dark and peaceful and… wrong.

A twig snaps, followed by a rustle to her right. Against all logic, Rey sprints in the noise’s direction, stumbling over dead logs and fallen branches until that same _something_ is telling her to stop. Her eyes are beckoned upwards, where they meet another pair, glowing and inhuman. 

No, not a pair. She counts six eyes total, varying in size but clustered together, like they belong to the same creature. 

Oh. 

They belong to the same creature. 

Out of some primitive instinct, Rey slowly grabs one of the branches that she had nearly tripped over, still lying near her feet. She never takes her eyes from the creature, whose body she is still trying to make out. Once she’s got a firm grip on her makeshift weapon, she straightens up, still slowly, so as not to startle whatever the thing is before her. The branch is probably thick enough to deliver a good blow, but she doubts it could help her for long. 

Rey’s eyes are just starting to adjust to the darkness when the thing lunges forward, all glowing eyes and obsidian teeth and claws dripping with _something_. She yelps, knocking the creature down with her stick, then runs like there’s hell on her heels (for all she knows, there might very well be). 

She reaches the bonfire unscathed and immediately runs to Rose and Finn, who are watching some drinking game unfold. 

“Finn! Rose!”

They turn, and once their eyes register her expression, their faces fall. 

Finn speaks first, nearly breathless, “Rey! What happened, are you ok? Why are you holding a branch?”

Rey looks down at her hands and immediately drops the stick as if it had scorched her. 

“We gotta go. Now.”

Rose’s eyes are flickering across every point of Rey’s body, likely scanning for injuries. “Where have you been? You look like you just rolled through a pile of leaves. Are you ok?”

“Guys. There’s something out there. In the woods. It, it lunged at me. Tried to attack me!” 

“Like an animal? A bear? An alligator? Why were you off by yourself anyways?” Finn grabs her shoulders to steady her, like she might fall apart any second.

“No no no it had these eyes, glowing eyes, six of them! And these teeth and claws and-“

“Are you hallucinating? Did you take shrooms?”

“What? Finn! No!”

Something dawns upon Rose, her face darkening with rage, “Oh my god, Finn. She’s been drugged. One of these asshole guys drugged her.”

“No! Guys, I’m fine. I mean I’m a little drunk but-“

“She’s shaking. Look at her! Get her some water and stay here while I go beat someone’s ass-“

“Rose wait-“ Finn seems completely panicked, torn between following Rose’s orders or holding her back before she starts a fight. 

“What’s the problem here?” A stranger, possibly one of the guys who held Rey’s ankles during her keg stand, has appeared with squared shoulders and a jutting chin. 

At some point, the band had stopped playing. Rey realizes that she has started to draw a crowd. She doesn’t blame them. To them, she’s just some girl, hair sticking in all directions, mud streaking her legs, who has burst out of the woods wielding a stick like a sword and exclaiming that a monster is chasing her.

“The problem is that one of your douchebag misogynistic friends fucking drugged my friend here! What the fuck is your deal?”

“Woah, woah, ok just because she couldn’t handle her liquor doesn’t mean anyone’s drugged her.”

Rose looks like she's about to burst. Honestly, Rey finds it a little terrifying. Finn must, too, because he has yet to step in her way. 

“Listen, she’s hot and all, but not enough to waste good stuff on. That shit’s expensive.” 

Now Rey is seeing red. She’s nearly forgotten the demonic creature in the woods, focused entirely on this horrible human being with the ability to drug girls that he deems hot enough. The way he talks about it, it’s like he’s done it before. 

Before she can think, Rey is grabbing the branch, preparing to knock down her second monster of the night. But before she can, Finn blocks her arm. 

“Think about your scholarship,” He whispers in her ear, her trustworthy (and sober) voice of reason. 

But the damage is done. Rey is standing, wild eyed with a branch above her head, paused mid swing in an attack clearly aimed for the douchebag, with an entire crowd of eyes staring at her. 

“I think you should leave,” Douchebag says. 

Rey drops the stick. The three of them shuffle away before they start a fight, the crazy girl flanked by her crazy friends. Finn guides her forwards, while Rose glares daggers back at the partygoers. After a few moments, the music resumes like nothing had ever happened. 

_Evil seeps in through the swamps._

She really needs to speak with Maz. 

———————————————

“Maz!” Rey calls into the shop the next day. The store, strangely, had been locked before Rey opened it with her own set of keys. 

Maybe she’s still here. Sometimes, Maz just closes the store if she doesn’t feel like dealing with customers that day. An inventory day, she calls it, though she doesn’t really log anything, just runs her fingers over some bookshelves and complains about the dust.

_Christ, how does this place even stay open?_

Beebee weaves himself through her ankles, eagerly meowing up towards her. 

There’s a note taped to the register. 

_ Rey,  _

_ So sorry to leave you right now. I know you’re still confused. Something came up. Urgent. Had to go. Not sure when I’ll be back. Please take care of Beebee and the shop in the meantime. _

_ Take care,  _

_ Maz.  _

 

The urge to scream bubbles up in Rey’s chest, but she pushes it down, boxing it up somewhere, at least for the cat’s sake.

Maz had only barely introduced an idea to her, something that completely changed her perception of the world, something that she was beginning to witness in her own life, and Maz _left_ before she could fully explain it. 

She just left. 

Left like everyone does. 

Left, like her parents did.

Left, like how in a few weeks, her friends will inevitably leave her to ride out this summer completely alone. 

Rey feels restless, upset, and a little panicked. Her mind feels like how the basement did a few days ago: a whirlwind, knocking and shattering what’s left on her brains’s shelves. 

How dare Maz just drop that bomb and not stay to pick up the pieces. 

How dare she. 

How dare she not let Rey ask her questions.

How dare she keep her from her answers. The answers that she rightfully deserves. 

There it is again. A silver hook behind her ribs, pulling her forwards. The churning. The call. It’s different this time: steady, more certain. It’s drawing her towards the basement. 

“Fuck it.”

Beebee looks concerned, as much as a cat can look concerned. 

If Maz wasn’t going to give Rey answers, she’d find them herself. After all, she didn’t get this far in life without doing her homework. She’d go right to the source of all of this. Right to where the problem started. She’d go to him. 

_“He?”_

_“Yes, ‘he.’ Kylo Ren.”_

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if the pacing is slow! Again, took me more words than I thought it would, so I think it's panning out to be a slowburn fic. There will be Kylo in the next chapter, I promise! I have this story mostly planned out, so I'm hoping I'll be able to get the next few chapters out soon. Thank you so much for reading! Comments are greatly appreciated, I love to hear what you guys think :) 
> 
> Follow/message me on tumblr: jahkku 
> 
> http://jahkku.tumblr.com/

**Author's Note:**

> Again, thank you so much for reading! Let me know what you think! There will be more Kylo in other chapters, I promise.


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